Intel NAS Performance Toolkit
Intel NASPT is another disk sub-system test that uses real-life usage scenarios. Like PCMark 7, Intel NASPT reproduces predefined disk activity traces and measures how fast they are executed. However, the default traces are designed for network attached storage devices rather than for SSDs. Therefore during our test session we replace them with the specially developed SSD Benchmarking Suite which offers more relevant usage scenarios such as compressing and decompressing files, compiling large projects, copying files and folders, loading 3D game levels, installing software, batch-processing photos, searching a digital library for data, mass-launching applications, and transcoding video.
Like PCMark 7, this benchmark gives us a true-to-life illustration of disk subsystem performance. Here the SSDs are again tested in their “steady” state.
After delivering average performance in Futuremark PCMark 7, the Kingmax SMP35 Client 480GB finds itself in last place according to Intel NASPT, close behind the OCZ Octane. We shouldn’t worry about that until we check out the individual subtests, though. The detailed INASPT results help us see what usage scenarios are the most suitable for our today’s testing participants.
Note that the data-transfer rate is higher than the SATA III interface bandwidth in some subtests. That’s because INASPT is a high-level test that uses standard Windows functions to access the disk subsystem. As a result, the OS caching mechanisms also affect the results.
The low overall score of the Kingmax SMP35 Client 480GB in Intel NASPT is due to its low performance in four subtests, three of which are about copying large files to the SSD and the fourth one is a gaming load. On the other hand, there are usage scenarios that highlight the strong points of the Kingmax solution. For example, it outperforms the Vertex 4 in the software compilation subtest.